New home for Liverpool’s fruit and veg market

Liverpool’s fruit, vegetable and flower market is set to move to a new home at a £7 million food hub in Gillmoss.

The new 80,000 sq ft facility at Stonebridge Business Park, which will replace the existing rundown market near Edge Lane, will include a café, public toilets and parking.

The new market aims to complement other redevelopment projects in the area, including industrial units and the new £12m Geopost DPD parcel depot.

A further phase of the development will open up opportunities for meat and fish traders to relocate to the business park.

Around 10 acres of the fruit, vegetable and flower market’s existing site is set to be redeveloped as a new home for a Merseyside Police patrol hub, while also providing space for the force’s vehicle repair facility, currently based at Smithdown Lane.

Some land will also be used to rebuild the neighbouring St Cuthbert’s Catholic Primary School, while the remaining nine acres fronting Prescot Road is set to be used for new housing.

Councillor Malcolm Kennedy, cabinet member for regeneration, says: “This is a really exciting scheme which I know traders are delighted with.

“The existing market is in a really poor condition and the number of traders has been dwindling for a very long time, so we have been working hard to identify a new site which will put it on a solid footing and enable it to expand in the future.

“We are also confident that we will be able to transfer the popular Sunday market and car boot sale over to the new location. This is all part of our wider aim of driving up the standard and quality of Liverpool’s markets now we’ve taken back control of them.”

Work on the new food hub could begin before the end of the year with a view to the market opening by September 2017, subject to planning permission.